From the Beginning. Tracy Wolff
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perhaps the entire world—Amanda flounced to where she and Simon had been sitting.
Strike that. To where Simon had been sitting and she’d been lying, unconscious. The bastard.
Refusing to sit next to him for one second longer—no matter how juvenile that made her—she plopped herself into the single seat on the other side of the aisle. As she did, she realized that the plane was quite luxurious. This wasn’t some little charter jet from Africa—this plane spoke of money and executives and power. It didn’t seem like Simon’s normal style, but then, she reminded herself abruptly, a lot of things could happen in eighteen months. She wasn’t the same woman she’d been a year and a half ago. Why should Simon not have changed?
The thought made her uncomfortable, particularly since she had plans to be coldly furious with the old Simon for the next five decades or so. She didn’t want to imagine Gabby’s death as having affected him. She didn’t want to have any sympathy for him at all.
Of course, he wasn’t too different from the old Simon. Otherwise he never would have dragged her out of Somalia without her permission. Although, if she was going to be technical, Jack had been the one to drug her. At Simon’s behest, obviously, but her oldest friend had betrayed her as surely as her ex-lover had. The next time she saw Jack, she’d have something to say to him and it wasn’t going to be pretty.
“Amanda, please.” Simon had settled himself across the aisle from her. “Can we talk about this?”
She very deliberately turned her head away from him. Nothing good would come from talking to him right now. The way she was feeling, she was as likely to hit him as she was to tell him to go to hell. And while she didn’t mind the latter, she’d never been a violent person and didn’t relish the thought of becoming one, even with these extenuating circumstances.
Of course, looking out the window only made her angrier. It had been night when she and Jack were talking in her tent and now it was full daylight outside. Which meant a lot of time had passed, especially considering the fact that they were traveling west. If only a few hours had passed, it would still be pitch-black.
The thought galvanized her, made her speak when she’d sworn to herself that she wasn’t going to say another word. “Where are we?”
He cleared his throat, shifted uncomfortably. “A few hours out of Atlanta.”
“Atlanta?” she demanded incredulously. “How long have I been out?”
“About sixteen hours.”
“Sixteen— What the hell did you give me? Ketamine? You could have killed me!”
“I called Jack when we stopped to refuel. He had me check your vitals, and they were fine. He said the sedative was probably hitting you so hard because of how run-down you are.”
“I’m overwhelmed by both of your concern.” Sarcasm dripped from every syllable as she turned back around to face the window. Looking at the clouds was a lot easier than looking at Simon right now.
“Don’t do that,” he said suddenly. “Don’t pretend I’m not here—I used to hate when you did that.”
“What you like and don’t like is high on my priority list right now.” She refused to give him the satisfaction of facing him.
“I hate how you always retreat behind that stony wall of silence. I know you’re mad at me—you have the right to be. But can we talk it out like adults instead of sulking like a couple of children who’ve lost their ball on the playground?”
The words were clipped, crisp, and she realized it had been years since his accent sounded so heavy. He really was as upset by this whole thing as she was. Good. He deserved it. If that made her bitter and unfeeling, so be it. But at least she wasn’t a criminal—transporting another person from one continent to another without her permission.
“What do you want me to say, Simon?” The words were wrenched from her. “That it’s okay that you did this? It isn’t. Not at all. I’ve been making my own decisions since I was seventeen years old. I don’t appreciate one of this magnitude being taken out of my hands. And Atlanta? What the hell is in Atlanta?”
“My apartment. A little over a year ago, I took a job at a cable network based out of Atlanta.”
Despite herself, she glanced around at the very lush interior of the plane. “I think you mean you took a job at the cable network based in Atlanta, don’t you?”
He flushed a little. “Pretty much.”
She didn’t say anything else. She didn’t know what to say, not when she was so shocked at the changes in Simon. A couple of years ago, there was no way he’d have tied himself to anyone. He’d relished being one of the top freelance journalists in the world, free to follow whatever story caught his fancy.
“I still travel a lot, though. I’m one of the people they send out when all hell breaks loose somewhere in the world.”
And there it was. That sounded like the Simon she knew. An inexplicable sense of relief filled her.
When she still didn’t respond, he cleared his throat. “Are we going to talk about this?” he asked. “About what happened in Africa and about…how you ended up here?” His voice trailed off lamely.
“Do you want me to wrap my hands around your throat and squeeze until your eyes bug out of your head?” she asked, sugar-sweet. “No? Then we probably shouldn’t talk quite yet. I’m still a little raw.”
He sighed heavily. “I’m sorry, Amanda. I really am.”
“You’re not the least bit sorry. Don’t insult me by pretending that you are.”
“You were killing yourself.”
“I was working. It’s what I do.” She forced herself to lower her voice, to swallow the words and insults and pain that wanted to spill out. Wanted to spill all over him. Taking a deep breath, she said as civilly as she could, “I was leaving, anyway. I was already packed.”
“You wouldn’t have come to the States—wouldn’t have gotten the rest you need.”
“That’s not your problem. I’m not your problem.”
“I can’t stand by and watch you do that to yourself.”
“Nobody asked you to. You could have gone on your merry way. God knows, you’re good at that.”
“Damn it, Amanda. I want to help you!” His voice was raw, impassioned. “When are you going to see that? When are you going to let me in?”
“Damn it, Simon,” she mimicked him, but her voice was as devoid of feeling as his was overwrought. “I don’t want your help. When are you going to figure that out? When are you going to leave me alone?”
It was his turn to lock his jaw. His turn to face the window and the seemingly infinite sky.
She knew he was angry. Knew that, even more, he was hurt by his inability to reach her. For a brief second, she tried to care. She’d never been one to take pleasure in someone else’s pain. But when she reached down inside of herself, tried to find some remnant of the feelings she’d once had for him, there was nothing left. Only a terrible numbness.
She went back to looking out the window herself. Started counting clouds. It was going to be a long few hours until they landed in Georgia.
SIMON UNFASTENED HIS SEAT BELT with combined feelings of relief and unease. Relief because they were finally in Atlanta after what had been one of the most emotionally uncomfortable flights of his life, with the exception of the one after Amanda had called to inform him that Gabby was dead.
He was uneasy, though, because these past few hours of silence between them had been colder than the temperatures he’d endured in Antarctica covering a story on climate change. The emotional chill and Amanda’s total and complete introspection